61% of people making over $250k/yr drive a Honda, Toyota or Ford

950,000 places you easily in the top 1/3 of one percent of households in income. The odds that you are in that position are not very high. I will leave it at that.

A new Toyota Landcruiser starts at $85k, just saying....

yep this makes sense wrote:

I make over 400k and drive a 2013 Buick Lacrosse, purchased from Carmax with 20,000 miles on it for 20k. I try to never spend more than 20k on cars. They are mostly about utility - getting from point a to point b - and it is foolish to spend a lot on a car. By the way, the Lacrosse is a nice car - about as nice as one would need - so I am not driving in a shabby vehicle.

A Buick? Ugh! What are you 80 years old?

I bet some day soon youll mistake the gas pedal for the brake and plow through the front of the Dollar Store.

are you the real Dave Ramsey?

I think my econ teacher (HS) is in love with you.

Rocky Mountain High wrote:

My wife and I have household income 335k/year-probably closer to 375k this year

I have a 9 year old subaru, 125k miles -worth 9k

Wife bought a 3 year old Audi a4-worth 15k. Had to fill it up with premium gas yesterday, was hard to watch.

Cars are the biggest waste of money. Id rather go on a luxury vacation each year for 10k than buy a 50k car.

I agree entirely with the sentiment of this post. My wife and I have a similar combined income to you and also drive modest cars. However, I can tell you for certain that your 9 year old Subaru is NOT worth $9K. $6K if you’re lucky.

Rocky Mountain High wrote:

My wife and I have household income 335k/year-probably closer to 375k this year

I have a 9 year old subaru, 125k miles -worth 9k

Wife bought a 3 year old Audi a4-worth 15k. Had to fill it up with premium gas yesterday, was hard to watch.

Cars are the biggest waste of money. Id rather go on a luxury vacation each year for 10k than buy a 50k car.

Similar household income here--8 year old Nissan Frontier pickup-50k miles-good for mountain trips, limited commuting, try to bike most days-wife has a 3 year-old Hyundai Santa Fe-hard to justify spending a lot on cars even with decent income -especially with short commutes (15 min round trip); Hard to justify spending 10-12k a year on car payments for a household for declining assets-to each their own!

IggyAzaela wrote:

yep this makes sense wrote:

I make over 400k and drive a 2013 Buick Lacrosse, purchased from Carmax with 20,000 miles on it for 20k. I try to never spend more than 20k on cars. They are mostly about utility - getting from point a to point b - and it is foolish to spend a lot on a car. By the way, the Lacrosse is a nice car - about as nice as one would need - so I am not driving in a shabby vehicle.

A Buick? Ugh! What are you 80 years old?

I bet some day soon youll mistake the gas pedal for the brake and plow through the front of the Dollar Store.

One of the reason I obtained such a good deal on the Lacrosse is because of people like you, who brand the car for old people (I am 59, and not so young). I looked at the cars with above average reliability ratings which also had the highest depreciation. The Lacrosse was one of five models that came up - my car depreciated 18 grand in 2 years from 38k to 20k. I am no automobile expert, but as a financial play it was sensible. The money saved I invest, although as I get older I need to ratchet down the risk in my investments soon. My wife only wanted a CRV - those don’t depreciate so much - but again - we bought a low mileage two year old model with everything on it. Thank goodness she and my daughters are frugal, as my capacity to say no to my wife and adorable daughters is limited.

I'm there and both of my cars cost less than $25K new. I bought both of them used. Couple years old saves so much money. Nissan and a Subaru

Its actually a 2011 subaru--youre right KBB $7k private sale

It's OK if you're driving on the island of Lesbos.

Awd, bitches wrote:

I’m over that and drive a Subaru, is that ok?

Toyotas can be expensive wrote:

A new Toyota Landcruiser starts at $85k, just saying....

I think there is only one option for the Landcruiser and that might be exactly $85k.

I make >250k, and we have a 4yo Subaru bought new and a 6yo Land Rover freelander bought used. Both are fantastic cars and I’d buy them again. Day to day commute I use a motorcycle to save gas and go around traffic.

That's America for you.

People who make 16+ million rubles per year in Russia are outright rich and don't drive at all, they have a private driver. Their spoiled kids might drive some luxury cars though.

There are some wonderful cars which are very expensive, however the maintenance, insurance and MPG figures can mean that the running costs might be very high. As others have said $250k/yr can be a heck of a lot in some locations whilst in others, property costs mean that there isn't that much left over. I'd be interested in knowing the stats of how many people in large cities who earn over $250k don't have a car. Certainly in London I think there would be a decent chunk who don't need one, and I would be interested to know if it was the same in NY or LA

Dave Ramsey, CFA wrote:

Discuss

That would be me...………...2010 Toyota FJ with 243K on it, wife 2008 Jeep Wrangler, 190K. No plans to get rid of either.

All of you make so much money. And of course it is mostly lies although I am not sure why you lie but you do.

5 million households earn $250k and you don't believe 5 or 10 of those are posting here?

Turns out people that buy "luxury" cars really shouldn't be doing so...my parents made around 300k a year and we always had a Toyota and a Honda, no Mercedes or BMWs or anything. My aunt and uncle made about 3 times that, but they had luxury cars and were far less smart with their money...and turned out it was their kids who had to go to a public college because they couldn't afford a private one.

doubt it wrote:

I'm calling BS on that statistic. Those three manufacturers combined only account for 38% of the US market share, so highly doubtful that they have a 61% share in any single demographic much less the highest earning one.

There is no link to support the OP's claim but both that stat and your 38% market share can be true if these high earners by multiple vehicles.

Say a high earner drives a Mercedes E Class on a regular basis, has a Ford F150 pickup for some errands a drives a Porsche 911 on nice weekends.

That would support the 61% number and 38% at the same time.

Maybe 61% of high earners do have a Honda, Toyota or Ford while 33% of their total vehicles fall into that group.

These people very likely have more than one vehicle.